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“Hel-mut New-ton,” French hairstylist Odile Gilbert all but spelled out when explaining the beauty inspiration for **Jason Wu’**s spring 2014 collection—not that the enunciation was necessary; one look at the sleek center-parted hair Gilbert had lengthened with extensions and gathered into tight, blunt-cut ponytails was all it took to spot the iconic photographer’s brand of subversive chic.

“Hair like this, it [looks] tough,” said Gilbert, who was prepping strands with Kérastase K Gloss Appeal Instant Shine and Topcoat Spray for a high-gloss effect, then working the company’s K Short Mania Semi-Matte Sculpting Paste over face-framing panels for a deliberately slick effect that put the focus squarely on models’ faces. “It means you have nothing to hide.” Each ponytail was then decorated with a graphic metallic rose—or yellow-gold Sylvain Le Hen clip, which Wu sourced for the runway show himself. As it turned out, Gilbert is plenty familiar with the cult accessory. “He used to be my assistant,” she said proudly of Le Hen, finishing each style with a burst of Kérastase’s K Laque Couture Micro-Mist Fixing Hairspray.

Acting as a deliberately feminine counterpart to that strict, scraped-back runway hair, Wu—who has become something of a beauty expert in recent months, thanks to his new makeup collaboration with Lancôme—wanted something softer on the face. At his request, makeup artist Diane Kendal outlined models’ eyes in Lancôme’s Le Crayon Khôl in Black Coffee before dusting the lids with an assortment of gilded shadows from its Color Design Eye Brightening All-in-One 5 Shadow & Liner Palette in Bronze Amour. To heighten the effect, she pressed a fine rose-gold glitter over the top—a nod to the shimmering fluidity of Wu’s runway dresses, many of which were cut on the bias this season.

“Jason picked it out,” Kendal said of the precise shade of those sparkling flecks. She painted them onto Élise Crombez’s lids, using a damp brush before etching a thin stroke of—what else?—Jason Wu for Lancôme Artliner in Noir close to the upper lash line. Multiple coats of mascara and a sheer, rosy wash of the company’s Baume in Love lip tint finished the look—which Wu seemed plenty pleased with in the end. As he came over to pay his respects to Crombez, the designer couldn’t contain his excitement. “It looks great!” he proclaimed.